Analogue delights: The Tempest with the RSC at the Barbican
The Tempest
Royal Shakespeare Company
Barbican
Gallery A2 (moved to be more central), £10
6 July 2017
RSC page
The RSC's advertising for The Tempest has led on two things: Simon Russell Beale is in it; and IT’S DIGITAL. I shouldn’t moan – everyone knows advertising is difficult – but it’s also maybe not that surprising that the production’s great successes result from more of a collaborative effort, and are largely analogue.
On which, Alan summarized the Digital neatly when he described it as impressive but not beautiful. I’ll be honest with you and admit I went in sceptical: how much does Shakespeare need Intel? You’ll spot straight away that that’s the wrong question: does, you counter, Shakespeare ‘need’ actors? There’s much to admire here in the Digital’s sensitive deployment under director Gregory Doran, and early on I was forced to agree that in many ways The Tempest is the ideal play on which to lavish the cutting-edge scenic technology of the day.
Cutting-edge but still rough around the edges. This is not the finished product but more of a stepping stone. A digital Ariel is very impressively live motion-tracked to the actor – but despite all those processors whirring away somewhere there is still a distracting, illusion-dispelling delay between the actor's movements and those of his light-constructed counterpart. And as Alan identifies, the digital work on the whole is just not very aesthetically pleasing; whether this is a limitation of the present technology or of the people involved, I don't know. But nevertheless, it is undoubtedly a worthy endeavour: an intermediate on the way to what may well become a common stage tool.
The true strength, though, of Doran’s snappy and entertaining production is its cast. Jenny Rainsford as Miranda and Mark Quartley as Ariel each give exceptional performances, sensitively inflected and lightyears away from the hackneyed niches these two characters can sometimes slide into. Joe Dixon as Caliban, despite the encumbrance of a ghastly costume, finely balances the role’s ambiguities. Daniel Easton as Ferdinand is pleasingly (if unsubtly) dorkish. Their concise characterization and attuned delivery are matched by the rest of the cast.
And then there’s Simon Russell Beale! Some reviews have called it a career-best performance; I won’t say it isn’t but I’m also not sure how they could set it apart from his Timon or Lear of recent years. Here as then he speaks beautifully. It is a privilege and a joy to hear him speak this poetry. Otherwise I don’t think the success of his interpretation can be disentangled from his engagement with the rest of the cast. Beale, Rainsford, Quartley and Dixon together make this a performance to cherish.
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